The Chinese search engine Baidu has filed a lawsuit against Apple & “relevant” app developers allegedly selling counterfeit versions of its newly released Ernie bot application on the App Store. The artificial intelligence-powered chatbot Ernie has been regarded as the most competitive substitute for the US-developed ChatGPT in China.
ChatGPT’s immediate rival is Baidu’s Ernie chatbot. It is a Baidu AI product that has reportedly been in production since 2019. Yet it was only made available a short time after ChatGPT went global.
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According to the business, Ernie is fully capable of processing natural language and can converse, answer questions live online, write articles, write codes, etc.
On Friday, Baidu declared that it has registered cases in Haidian People’s Court, Beijing, against Apple and also the app developers who created the knockoff editions of its Ernie bot. There isn’t yet an official Ernie app accessible, according to a comment from Baidu on its main “Baidu AI” WeChat account.
“At present, Ernie does not have any official app,” Baidu said in a statement late on Friday posted on its official “Baidu AI” WeChat account.
“Until our company’s official announcement, any Ernie app you see from App Store or other stores are fake,” it said.
Source: reuters.com
Baidu also uploaded a picture of its court document, emphasizing that until a formal notice is made, any Ernie apps that seem to be accessible through the App Store or any other stores are fake.
Apple has not made any comment on the circumstances yet. According to a search done by Reuters on Saturday, at least four applications with the Mandarin name “Ernie bot” are still available on the App Store, but they are all fake.
As per Baidu, those who have gotten legitimate access codes are the only ones who can access the Ernie bot. In its comment, the business also issued a warning against people who try to sell access codes.
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The AI-backed chatbot known as Ernie, meaning “Enhanced Representation through Knowledge Integration,” was introduced by Baidu in March of this year. Because of the popularity of ChatGPT powered by Microsoft, Chinese businesses and tech companies are racing to develop a rival.
Baidu’s cloud platform currently enables businesses to include the bot in their services by submitting a request. Originally, the Ernie bot was only obtainable to a small set of customers with invitation credentials.
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